Comments | happydalek: Info Dump and musey musings.

happydalek

Info Dump and musey musings.

Dec 14, 2009 22:54

Not much fandomish going on in my life right now. Working full time (ish...two part time jobs) has kild my muse ded for the tiem being, it seems. Still watching Heroes but haven't made time for a proper reaction post because, frankly, most of the episodes have left me feeling rather "meh." Not much to report. Still trying to attempt a MMSR ( Read more... )

muse, fandom, doctor who, writing

Comments 9

alto2 December 15 2009, 05:51:55 UTC

Am I rude now?" Yes, you are. You're a power-tripping jerk. I guess I kept thinking he'd get over it, or I was imagining it. I kept trying to look past it, but Rusty, in his authorial brilliance, wouldn't let me, because he's been steadily emphasizing it.It baffles me why you would deliberately make your lead character, especially a hero, unlikeable. It baffles me even more why you would be David Tennant and gush about how the writer who decided to make your character unlikeable and make the audience long for you to leave the part is the most wonderful writer since William Shakespeare, if not before. I wanted to like Ten so, so much. And there were moments where I did. And yet...there were enough moments where I just wanted to smack him that this era is forever tainted for me. And I can't help feeling it was such a waste of David Tennant's talents that he should be asking for his time back to go to do other projects better suited to him ( ... )

happydalek December 16 2009, 03:00:49 UTC

"Unlikeable" heroes are the new thing. But even in those cases, the heroes are only unlikeable to the other characters, not to the audience. Ten isn't a guy I love to hate, I just plain don't like him. Maybe it's a personal thing, considering how incredibly popular the show continues to be. Maybe Rusty's grating worldview resonates with the masses and we're a vocal minority of disgruntled fans. And maybe I'm just desperate to be optimistic. ;)

I guess my bottom line is that if Rusty was making some Big Point about hubris and greed, he took waaaaay too long to do it, at the expense of a character and premise that I love. It really is like he's breaking his toys so no one else can play with them.

alto2 December 16 2009, 03:08:18 UTC

I don't think it's a personal thing, unless it's a personal thing for a fair number of us. I think kids love him, and I think nostalgia keeps things floating along, but the simple fact of it is that Ten has done quite a lot of things that most people wouldn't put up with from people they wanted to consider friends (and I don't even mean things that go as far as committing genocide on the Racnoss, I mean things as basic as Harriet Jones, right there in TCI. Shoulda known right then and there that things weren't all they seemed with Ten).

I guess my bottom line is that if Rusty was making some Big Point about hubris and greed, he took waaaaay too long to do it, at the expense of a character and premise that I love.

YES. YES YES YES YES YES. THIS. Only Uncle Russ would take FIVE YEARS to do what Icarus did in a few paragraphs. And I think you're right about him breaking his toys. He must've been a real pill as a child.

stoplookingup December 16 2009, 02:33:49 UTC

And it took me his entire tenure to figure out that the reason it wasn't working is because 10 is designed to be unlikeable.

Yeah, well, it kind of throws you off the trail when they have all the other characters falling all over themselves in love with the guy. It's not that I want characterization to be cartoonishly obvious, but there was so much obfuscation surrounding Ten that I couldn't even be sure the writers were aware of what they were doing. I think Rusty thought he was revealing Ten's character gradually when in fact he was just confusing the audience.

happydalek December 16 2009, 02:54:52 UTC

It is possible I'm confusing bad writing with experimental/clever writing. It's a pretty fine line sometimes.

alto2 December 16 2009, 03:10:18 UTC

It is possible I'm confusing bad writing with experimental/clever writing.

::falls on floor laughing:: Are you serious? And if you are, we're not talking about Rusty anymore, right? Not the King of the Obvious and Lowest Common Denominator Approach? Experimental? Clever? OMG, I need to take a deep breath before I hurt myself over here...

;)

happydalek December 16 2009, 03:26:12 UTC

On an unrelated note, your icon makes me want to cling to my Series 1 boxset and pretend the finale to that one never happened.

Looking at Rusty's body of work (in Who), I thought "Aliens of London," "The Christmas Invasion," "Love & Monsters," "Midnight," and "Turn Left" were very good episodes (or at least had enough to recommend them). There are some things the man writes very well, which makes it so very unfortunate when he keeps committing the same errors over and over again. I don't know why he doesn't just stick with what he's good at. Except that would require admitting that there are things he doesn't write well, and nobody in his position would do that, especially when so many people are lapping up the dreck as much as the good.

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